1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a non-lethal active body which is equipped with a detonation-operated electrical pulse generator, and which is especially deployable as an article of submunition.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
An active body of that type is known as a microwave disrupter which is utilized for influencing the functioning of generally signal communications or guidance and control installations. The active body can be deployed as an article of submunition in accordance with the disclosure of European Patent Publication EP 075 572 24 A1, installed as a lurking mine pursuant to German Patent Publication DE 19 528 112 C1, or fired as a grenade in accordance with the disclosure of U.S. Pat. No. 5,192,827. With regard to the grenade constructed pursuant to the U.S. Pat. No. 5,192,827, prior to the firing, an internal electrical energy storage battery or accumulator is charged in the barrel or launch tube from an external current source, wherein the accumulator is then discharged upon reaching the object which is to be disrupted, by means of a spark gap, and thereby as a result generates high-frequencies disturbances. However, the power which is available for this purpose, in accordance with the behavior of the current source and the energy accumulator or battery, is extremely limited, and the loss or ohmic resistance of the capacitive charge accumulator, necessitates an excessively large capacitive time constant with regard to the sought after discharge time behavior over the spark gap.
In the two first mentioned instances a detonation-operated magneto-hydrodynamic system which is located on board of the active body serves as an electrical pulse generator, whereas within the framework of the present invention description where must be taken into consideration for the detonation operation, propellent charge materials, as well as explosives materials. For current amplification and exciting oscillations, that pulse generator has a similarly detonation-operated magnetic field compressor connected to the output thereof which compressor is to act radially on the center axis, and which irreversibly reduces the cross-sectional surface of a cylindrical coil which is just to be streamed through by the pulse current from the generator.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to further develop an active body of the type under consideration for the utilization thereof as a projectile-like deployable, autonomous explosives-operated microwave source of reduced constructional size with a concurrent increase in degree of effectiveness in a direction towards selectable disruptive spectra, and in connection therewith to open up capabilities of constructive and circuitry technology modifications and further embodiments with a view towards different scenarios for application.
The foregoing object is inventively attained in that the pulse generator is a piezo-generator having a detonation-operated inductive current amplifier and a capacitive pulse shaper connected to the output thereof.
Further objects of the invention reside in that the combination of the pulse generator with different pulse shapers is adapted for different radiation spectra and the technological apparatus design apparatus for such combinations.
In accordance with the invention, in contrast with the utilization of a magneto-hydrodynamic generator pursuant to the state of technology, there is employed a more compactly constructed pulse generator which is excited under the effect of a detonation pressure wave with a comparatively large-volumed piezo-crystal for the emitting of a high current pulse, to the output of which there is similarly connected a detonation-operated inductive current amplifier ahead of a capacitive pulse shaper. In the pulse generator there can be implemented an axial pressure imposition from at least one massive (cubic or cylindrical) piezo-crystal, or a radial pressure imposition from at least one ring-shaped piezo-crystal. When a plurality of piezo-crystals are connected to each other, in order to produce a higher pulse output, then there are expediently introduced shock absorbers between the piezo-crystals which are connected either in parallel or series, in order to resiliently cushion the detonatively triggered mechanical pressure build-up during the transmission to the presently successive crystal bodies.
The pulse generator and the current amplifier are preferably assembled space-savingly coaxially behind each other, however, partially overlapping each other, in effect, axially interengaging, so as to be able to upon the triggering of the one functional element to be able to concurrently trigger through to the other, and to achieve a compact and resultingly lighter-weight deployable active body. The coaxial cable or respectively, hollow conductor for pulse shaping can be wound about the pulse generator, whose diameter is typically smaller than that of a current amplifier, and also smaller than that of the antenna, so that the antenna itself, in the interest of obtaining an axially short construction of this active body, at an expedient electrical degree of efficiency of its functional components, can be axially slid most closely against the pulse generator.
The effect of a herein preferred, similarly detonatively-operating inductive current amplifier is preferably predicated on an axial continually advancing opposite short-circuiting of adjacently located windings of a cylinder coil which is presently streamed through by the generator-current pulse. A capacitive pulse shaper which is connected in series with the pulse generator and coil, forms in conjunction with the coil, whose inductivity decreases rapidly, an electrical oscillating system with a rapidly rising resonance frequency, which is radiated as the carrier frequency band through the remaining coil windings which act as an antenna. Superimposed on this amplitude-modulated high-frequency carrier are the highest-frequencied disruptive components which are based on high voltage arc-overs, which are produced during the advancing coil short-circuit in the microwave frequency band.
For attaining a most possibly narrow-banded defined spectrum of the energy rich microwave radiation, the piezo operator instead of operating on the series resonance capacities operates more expediently on a pulse shaper in the form of a coaxial conductor designed in accordance with Blxc3xcmlein for the supplying of a vircator, to the output of which there is connected, through a wave conductor, a horn antenna which is correlated with this comparatively narrow generated frequency band. When instead of the foregoing, there is given preference to a broader radiation spectrum, then there is supplied a spiral or snail-shaped antenna structure through a pulse shaper in the type of a coaxial pulse compression conduit, possibly through the conversion of generated unipolar pulses into shorter bipolar pulses.
In order not to excessively limit the radiatable microwave output through short-circuiting phenomena between the dipoles of a miniaturized antenna, the antenna structure operates expediently in an insulating gas space, which is preferably formed towards the end of the deployment phase of the active body through the extension and filling of a balloon, when the detonative conversion commences for activation of the pulse-generator and the current pulse-amplifier. For the presented and subsequently described components of explosive operated microwave generators, there is contemplated legal protection for the exemplary representation not only with regard to its opposite combination, but also the construction of the apparatus of the present circuitry components themselves are considered to be novel and patentable.
In every instance, there is inventively equipped a non-lethal electromagnetic body, which is deployable in a direct shot or firing or as an article of submunition, in the interest of a more compact construction at a high current capacity with a detonation operated piezo pulse generator, which preferably operates on a pulse modulator in the form of a similarly detonation operated inductive current amplifier having a coil with forward advancing short-circuiting in an axial direction. The latter is interconnected with at least one oscillating capacitance, when operated not for a defined microwave radiation spectrum from the pulse generator, but upon occasion through the current amplifier, such as a horn irradiator through a Blxc3xcmlein pulse shaper and a vircator. For the supplying of a broad-banded radiating antenna, for pulse compression there can instead thereof be provided a coaxial cable, preferably with a bypass cable for bipolar pulse modulation, whose output signals which are recalled through a lengthy spark gap are shortened by means of a transverse spark gap. In order to be able to radiate a higher microwave output, the antenna is expediently operated below a balloon-like expandable radome in an insulating gas volume.